I look up and see / his curtains and bed: I look down and examine / his table and mat. The things are there / just as before. But the man they belonged to / is not there.
Wei Wēn-ti (translated by Arthur Waley)
Where these words come from
- 95% sureThese words were traced back to where they first appeared. That source is listed below.
- On the Death of his Father, in A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1918), p. 58; Opening four lines; full poem and attribution note read. Waley explicitly credits Wei Wēn-ti and rejects an earlier attribution to Han Wēn-ti. Retains the published caesura slashes. Public-domain English translation.
- On the Death of his Father, in A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1918), p. 58
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